My work is concerned with the descent of the ordinary human and how acceptance of a single injustice cascades into its normalization. The conventional narrative attributes historical tragedies, as a top-down function driven by evil leaders whose ideas proliferate downwards to society. However, ordinary people must participate to set up the conditions for tragedies to exist. 
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Through the limitless possibilities of expanded painting, I create indexical marks which deromanticize death and create an impression of deep concern. Timelessness and inequality are explored through site-specific work by implying spaces from Indian landscapes. My work seeks to evoke reflection on our social structures and morality by capturing in-equality and the rituals needed for its effect. I aim to explore the disparities between the powerful and the vulnerable by investigating the invasion of the body and challenging their inevitable deaths. By narrating intimate stories and experiences, I bring a unique understanding of issues affecting women while being able to deconstruct ‘culture’ and the role it plays in legitimizing injustice. 
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I wanted to show the juxtaposition between idealism and the reality of life for women in India. Violent and brutal rape is an Indian pandemic led by the “dominance” of men in the patriarchal society. Most cases of sexual assault go unreported therefore statistics can be misleading. However, the National Crime Records Bureau’s 2017 report stated that in 93% of cases, victims were raped by their grandfather, father, husband, brother, son and acquaintances. 90 women are raped every day and the victims are aged between 3 months to 80 years. 

The Hindu symbol for evocation, ‘Aswastika’, demonstrates a powerful woman rising from the ashes of trauma. The performance demonstrates the battle of confrontation when recollecting personal instances of physical and sexual abuse. The evocation of the Hindu Goddess Kali is synonymous to the upheaval of societal constructs in the fight for a hopeful change. Kali, ‘the goddess of time and thus of destruction and death. She is frightening but her black skin is shiny and luminous. She is loved because the terror that she emits also protects us, both inside and outside, from the demons who otherwise would constantly assail us’.² ‘Blood on your Hands’ portrays how culture moulds the rape and deaths of women within marriages. ‘Woman, Vessel’ captures how a human being is reduced to an inanimate object whose only task is to bear the burdens of the house, society and children. Yet, in Hindu tradition, people deck idols of Goddesses up with jewellery and pray to them for a prosperous future every day.

I am committed to using my art as a vessel to challenge social control and question societies conformity to inequitable norms and values, rooted in my upbringing in India. Discrimination runs rife; female infanticide; women’s inequality; I strive to challenge techniques used to maintain injustice and our acceptance of repressive norms and values as ‘culture’.

¹ Unknown, Kali, 2020 < http://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O432639/kali-painting-unknown/>[accessed 21 February 2020]
² Franck André Jamme, Tantra Song (Los Angeles: Siglio, 2011)
Also view a work in progress, A Swastika Project, Documentary Photography